Wednesday, July 27, 2011

Earth's wobble causes global warming

EARTH’S WOBBLE CAUSES GLOBAL WARNING, NOT CO2 EMISSIONS OR OCEAN CURRENTS, PER TEAM HEADED BY OSU RESEARCHER Digital Journal, “Debate Ends on Central Cause of Earth’s Cooling & Warming,” 8 Aug 2009; Space Daily, “Ice Ages Linked to Slight Shifts in Solar Radiation,” 24 Aug 2009; The Kiplinger Letter, “Climate Change Legislation, What it Means to Business,” 18 Aug 2009.As the carbon dioxide management bill - aka cap and trade - looms in Congress, a new study from Oregon State University emerges that ends the scientific debate on the central causes of ice ages and warming periods on Earth.Former U.S. Vice President Al Gore is fond of saying that the scientific debate on global warming is over - and while he may now be correct in the fact that a debate has come to an end, the central cause behind climate change does not support the carbon cap legislation that is being cobbled together by Mr. Gore and his Democratic allies in the U.S. Congress.The earth cools and warms due to the wobble in its rotation and axis - factors in large-scale physics that human beings cannot control. These are factors, also, that human beings did not cause."Researchers have largely put to rest a long debate on the underlying mechanism that has caused periodic ice ages on Earth for the past 2.5 million years – they are ultimately linked to slight shifts in solar radiation caused by predictable changes in Earth's
rotation and axis," [i]Science Daily [/i]reported on Friday <http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/08/090806141512.htm> .The findings from the research team at Oregon State University were published in the journal Science and conclude that changes in solar radiation caused by wobbling set off predictable periods of ice ages and of warming. While ocean temperatures and greenhouse gases play a tangential role in this heating and cooling process, the wobble of the earth is the core reason.
"The melting was first caused by more solar radiation, not changes in carbon dioxide levels or ocean temperatures, as some scientists have suggested in recent years," Science Daily reported.The issue of global warming has been politicized around the world, and the concrete findings from Oregon State University are largely at odds with the human/carbon-cause perspective.
"Solar radiation was the trigger that started the ice melting, that's now pretty certain," said Peter Clark, the professor of geosciences at OSU who lead the study, according to Science Daily. "There were also changes in atmospheric carbon dioxide levels and ocean circulation, but those happened later and amplified a process that had already begun."
The amplification Professor Clark references will likely be reversed, as the planet's ongoing wobble is currently directing us into another ice age."Sometime around now, scientists say, the Earth should be changing from a long interglacial period that has lasted the past 10,000 years and shifting back towards conditions that will ultimately lead to another ice age – unless some other forces stop or slow it," Science Daily reported.The researchers employed an analysis of 6,000 dates and locations of ice sheets. This approach provided an incredibly accurate picture of when they started to melt.
"We can calculate changes in the Earth's axis and rotation that go back 50 million years," Clark said. "These are caused primarily by the gravitational influences of the larger planets, such as Jupiter and Saturn, which pull and tug on the Earth in slightly different ways over periods of thousands of years."The research was done in collaboration with scientists from the Geological Survey of Canada, University of Wisconsin, Stockholm University, Harvard University, the U.S. Geological Survey and University of Ulster. It was supported by the National Science Foundation and other agencies.Concern over climate change, and its cause, impacts us all. According to the August 18th Kiplinger Letter, climate change legislation, currently working its way through congress, will cause the costs of fuel and electricity to soar, despite the swift growth in alternative sources of energy, such as solar, wind power and geothermal. New regulations will add as much as 20% to utility rates by 2020. And that’s over and above any increases anticipated from changes in supply and demand. All told, the average cost for residential, commercial and industrial users may be 50% higher than today. In areas such as the Midwest and Southeast where coal fired power dominates, a 100% hike is likely.Motorists won’t get off easy, either. With climate change legislation, gas pump prices will be about $2 a gallon higher.